Article November 18, 1944 Issue

Impersonal Love

IRENE KENT

One of the contributors to the little book. "We Knew Mary Baker Eddy," tells an interesting incident which occurred in the class our Leader taught in 1898. She writes (p. 84): "After she had talked about the great need of love in everything we do, a pupil asked, 'Do you mean love of person?' Mrs. Eddy replied, in substance, No, I mean love of good. Then she was asked, 'How shall we know whether our love is personal or impersonal?' Her reply, in substance, was, When your love requires an object to call it forth, you will know it is personal; when it flows out freely to all, you will know it is impersonal."

We, her followers, sometimes yearn for this impersonal love of the Christ, and yet many times let it pass us by while we cling to the merely material love of person, which seems more tangible and satisfying, which promises all yet gives nothing. While we deprecate personal animosity, it is well to remember that personal attachment stems from the same source, and if possible works more ill because it comes in the name of good. To "a certain ruler" who called him "Good Master," Jesus replied, "There is none good but one, that is, God."

Repeatedly did Mrs. Eddy strive to keep a sense of personality from entering and stifling the purity of Christian Science. On numerous occasions she rebuked those who would have exalted -her own personality and turned them instead to God. On pages 308 and 309 of "Miscellaneous Writings," in an article entitled "Deification of Personality," she admonishes, "I earnestly advise all Christian Scientists to remove from their observation or study the personal sense of any one, and not to dwell in thought upon their own or others' corporeality, either as good or evil."

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